


my love, i can't hide, i can't hide.

by redhoods



Series: beaujester week 2019. [1]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Beaujester Week, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, First Kiss, Hopeful Ending, Love Confessions, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-25
Updated: 2019-07-25
Packaged: 2020-07-19 15:09:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19976122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redhoods/pseuds/redhoods
Summary: “Beau! Are you awake?” It’s Jester and through the wood, she sounds happy.Shoulders lowering, she pads barefoot to the door, feeling exposed without her arms wrapped, but there’s no point in doing all that tonight. She tugs the door open and squints at Jester, “If I had been, I wouldn’t be now.” There’s no bite to her words though, no meanness that she even tries to muster like she would have for anyone else.





	my love, i can't hide, i can't hide.

**Author's Note:**

> for beaujester week day one - first kiss. i'm still trying to find their voices, their flow. beau is easy to tap into for me though. i don't know how much i'll get written for this, but i'm gonna try to do at least three.
> 
> this is set during 2x71, the night they stay in nicodranas before they go back. i made myself sad with it.
> 
> lyrics from i want to hold your hand by the beatles, but like the version from across the universe by tv carpio.

The Lavish Chateau is unreasonably quiet.

It’s not like they haven’t spent nights here before, but somehow it’s quieter than usual and Beau isn’t sure if it’s all in her head or not. She thinks it might be. 

She also thinks it’s not the quiet that’s bothering her, but the lack of sound. Those are separate things in her head now, quiet and the absence of sound. Caleb is quiet with his books, but it’s not an absence of sound. Fjord is quiet when she sheers his hair, but there’s still the scrape of blade over short hair, the creak of her old scissors when she clips the too long bits. Caduceus is quiet when he prepares tea, but there’s still the soft whuff of his breath, the gentle bubble of boiling water.

Yasha had been quiet, but her absence is deafening.

Beau is still listening for the rumble of thunder, even thousands of miles away as they are.

Jester isn’t quiet though, not ever, except for now, lately. She covers it, not as well as she thinks she does, but she tries. Plasters on that smile, chatters on about everything and nothing, but she’s quieter at the edges. She talks less in her sleep even and Beau has heard her crying, trying to be quiet about that too.

Right now, she’s with her mom though and Beau hopes to herself that maybe it’ll help, even seeing her mom in fleeting. A reassurance that her mom is okay, that there’s still light spots in their life.

It’s hard not to believe in the good stuff with a mom like Marion, Beau figures.

Even harder not to after seeing a family reunited.

She scrubs at her eyes and doesn’t look at her reflection as she stands from the bed. The red material of the dress as soft and she rubs it between her fingers before she takes proper hold and draws it up. It catches a little around her shoulders, but she’s gentle as she tugs.

Gentle as she turns it right side out, smooths her hand over it, drapes it over the chair in her room.

She remembers the last time she’d worn a dress with a ferocity and a clarity she’d rather not, remembers how she’d treated it after, the hot angry tears as she’d torn it to pieces with her bare hands.

That same ugly feeling threatens to well up in her but she swallows it back as she pulls her own clothes on.

Someone knocks on the door and she freezes, though she isn’t sure why.

“Beau! Are you awake?” It’s Jester and through the wood, she sounds happy.

Shoulders lowering, she pads barefoot to the door, feeling exposed without her arms wrapped, but there’s no point in doing all that tonight. She tugs the door open and squints at Jester, “If I had been, I wouldn’t be now.” There’s no bite to her words though, no meanness that she even tries to muster like she would have for anyone else.

Jester beams at her and bullies her way passed. She’s still wearing that purple dress and it makes her eyes stand out as much as it makes Beau think of Molly. It’s hard not to think about him now with Calianna’s gift for him tucked away in her bag.

And Yasha’s gift.

She should do something with them, but she knows she won’t.

When she turns, Jester is touching the red dress where it’s draped over the chair, “You didn’t have to wear it, you know?” She says it very quietly, her thumb sweeping back and forth over the fabric.

Beau clears her throat, tries for bravado and fails, “When have I ever done something I didn’t want to?”

Jester arches a brow at her.

Beau blows out a breath, “You know what I mean, Jessie.”

Jester’s smile is watery and a little sad, “I don’t want to leave.”

“I know,” Beau can’t blame her for that, no more than she could blame Nott if she chose to stay, “You don’t have to. None of us would be upset with you.” She moves closer, sits on the edge of the bed facing towards Jester, braces her forearms on her thighs, looking down at her bare feet.

There’s a long stretch of quiet, but she doesn’t look up to see what Jester’s doing.

Then Jester clears her throat, “I’m not going to stay,” she says, then sighs quietly, “I mean, here, Nicodranas. I can’t stay here, while you guys are out there saving the world without me.” Then she sniffs, hard, and Beau doesn’t have to look up to picture the look on her face, her nose turned up just a little, “Besides, you guys wouldn’t survive a week without me.”

And then she hiccups, “Oh.”

Shoes come into her line of sight, Jester’s practical little booties with the white ruffles of her socks peeking out over the top. Beau looks up and Jester is crying, her face crumpled. 

“I didn’t mean that,” she says, very suddenly, “You would, you would, you would.”

Beau swallows and reaches for her, pulls her in.

Jester comes easily enough, collapses right into her lap, curls in against her, face against her throat. Her sobs come in hiccups and judders of her entire body, her fingers tight, too tight, where one hand curls around her bicep and the other around her back to her side.

“You would,” she says again, “I can’t lose anymore of you. You would survive, you will, I’m going to make sure of it.”

Beau wraps her arms around her, squeezes her in tighter, like that’s possible, “It’s okay, Jessie,” she says, because she’s not good at this and she’s not sure what else to do.

Jester hiccups again and Beau’s neck is getting damp, “It’s not,” she protests, “I couldn’t save Molly and I couldn’t save Yasha. And what if you--”

“We’re gonna be okay,” Beau interjects, because they've all been blaming themselves for it and she doesn’t think she’ll convince Jester anymore than she’ll convince Fjord.

Or herself.

She presses her face into Jester’s hair, swallows thickly as she runs her palm up and down Jester’s back, “We’re going to be okay because we’re going to stick together, because we’re all stronger together. Okay? There’s no one I’d rather do... all this shit with than you and these other idiots.”

Jester sniffles, “You don’t think I’m an idiot like the others?”

Beau hums like she’s considering, laughs when Jester prods at her side, both of them leaning back so they can see each other’s faces, “I think you’re the best of us, Jessie, and I think we’d all be lost without you.”

Still sniffling, Jester swipes at her eyes a few times, then her grin goes sly and silly and she leans in until they’re almost nose to nose, “Beau, are you secretly in love with me?”

And that’s the crux of it.

Beau clears her throat, tries to dart her gaze away but there’s nowhere else to look with Jester this close, decides _fuck it_ and says, “I don’t really think it’s a secret.” Her heart is pounding in her ears and that deafening silence is only a memory now, some lost thought at the back of her mind for how it sounds like gongs are going off in her brain.

Jester blinks and leans back, squints hard at her, “Beau...”

She sets her jaw, shakes her head, “No, it’s okay, you don’t--”

Jester cups an entire palm over her mouth, covers most of her lower face with it really, “You’re my best friend, you know?” She says it quietly, still squinting like she’s gonna find the secrets to everything. “I thought I--” she stops and shakes her head, “And Yasha,” she says, which makes even less sense, “But you.”

Beau feels like she’s only hearing half a conversation with no context as to what the conversation is even about.

“I love you, Beau,” she says then, gaze very intent, quietly serious in a way she doesn’t see out of Jester very often, “Not like I love anybody else. Not Mama, or Fjord, or Caleb, or Nott, or Caduceus,” she adds quieter, “Yasha or Molly.” Her smile is almost sad, watery, like she’s trying not to cry again, “I just do, because I know if I look, you’re always going to be right there, no matter what.”

Beau lifts an eyebrow at her.

Jester blinks, then giggles, “Oops!” And drops her hand down to her own lap.

“You’re my best friend,” she says first, more like blurts it out, because that’s very important. “I’m not-- I don’t--” She doesn’t know where to go from here, she’s never thought about it, never let herself hope.

“Hey Beau?”

She meets Jester’s gaze again, “Yeah?”

Jester kisses her then.

It’s an easy, undemanding press, chaste and soft.

Jester is also the first one to pull back, her face tinting purple almost, the color blooming high on her cheeks, “Was that okay?” She asks, eyes turned down, lashes fanning over the tops of her cheeks.

She touches Jester’s chin carefully, rubs her thumb over the apple of Jester’s cheek, “It was great, Jessie.”

Jester blinks at her, pleased surprise blooming over her features, “Yeah?”

Beau laughs, a soft rasp, barely there, but loud enough in the small space between them, “Perfect,” she says and means the kiss, means Jester, means the dark freckles on her cheeks, the sweep of her lashes, the curl of her hair around her horns, the slight peak of fang she gets when Jester grins wide.

“Good! I knew I would be good at that!” Jester claps her hands together and wiggles out of her lap to stand, rocking on her feet, “I’m going to get ready for bed and I’ll...” she draws it out, like she’s not sure what she was going to say.

“See you in the morning?” Beau offers.

Jester nods, “Yes!” She claps again then lowers her hands, fingers twisting together as she adds quieter, younger, “I think I might stay with Mama tonight, before we leave.”

Beau nods, pushing to her feet, “Enjoy all the time you can, but we’ll come back, yeah?” She pulls Jester to her, wraps her up in a hug, nearly gets her ribs cracked for it, but it’s all worth it, “We can visit.”

“Of course, we can!” Jester rallies well, which in this case Beau will take as a positive. She wiggles out of the hug, bracing her hands on Beau’s shoulders for a brief pause, squinting at her face again, before she beams, “Goodnight, Beau.”

“Night, Jessie.”

She gets a smacking kiss to the cheek before Jester bounds out of the room.

The silence left in the wake of her leaving is a little less deafening, but Beau thinks she’ll be hard pressed to hear anything over the pounding over her own heart for at least a day, maybe a week. She feels a little lighter though as she climbs into the bed and sleep finds her faster, no listening for the sound of thunder that won’t come for the first time in days.


End file.
